


the shared memory warm

by Riana1



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: F/M, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-29
Updated: 2013-08-29
Packaged: 2017-12-25 00:07:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/946316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Riana1/pseuds/Riana1
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In this world there is no Drift between you, only words.</p><p>Chuck Hansen and Heracles Hansen as father and son, not pilots.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the shared memory warm

**Author's Note:**

  * For [quigonejinn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/quigonejinn/gifts).



The silence drags on after the pleasantries- a gulf that e-mails and the occasional care package can’t fix, Chuck grinds his teeth in frustration. His father is a good man and grieving; Chuck remembers when his father left him in Colorado and despite the recollection of his own rootless heartbroken rage, Chuck remembers how his father looked.

Like a photocopy, blurred and blacked out, until Chuck couldn’t read him anymore.

Herc Hensen is the living hero of the goddam century, the only Jaeger pilot to come out of the mouth of hell alive.

Chuck isn’t a stupid kid; he has read all the specs and speculation on Jaegers and the Drift system. His father spent the last decade partnered with the golden girl of the entire Pan-Pacific.

Herc Hansen came out of the Breach alive.

Mako Mori didn’t.

And now Chuck Hansen has to make small talk about sports with his father while the firepit barely warms their hands as the autumn cold seeps in and Herc Hansen hemorrhages in front of him every possible but physical and there fuck all Chuck do about it.

Except keep jabbering on about the Cardinals chances at the Cup.

Fuck.

Then Sophie comes in. His sweet, sassy little ginger comes strolling on to porch and designs to leap into his father’s lap without a by your leave.

"Hey, aren’t you a pretty sheila."

Big green eyes promptly turn up at the soft husk of his father’s voice and close happily at the proper tribute of scratching behind the ears. Chuck pretends not to hear the choked sound of his father over the rusty motorboat of his girl and proceeds to ramble off the story of how a girlfriend surprised him with a kitten on their three month anniversary, how the girlfriend didn’t last to the four month anniversary, but he and Sophie were still going strong three years later.

The longest relationship of his life, Chuck jokes and smiles when his dad actually gives out an actual bark of laughter.

He goes out and gets a bulldog puppy the next day.

(Mainly because Chuck always imagine getting a bulldog with his dad as a kid, but mostly Sophie would kick him out of his bed if he dared bring home another cat. She would get under his bed where Chuck wouldn’t reach her and screech her displeasure until she got her way. There was a reason why Chuck didn’t have a girl longer than a few months. That and Chuck had the emotional maturity of a mud puddle- a fact repeated by several of his ex-girlfriends.)

There is protest from his dad, but minimal once the little puppy begins to slobber over Herc Hansen’s hand with great gusto.

Chuck knows this won’t fix his father (there is still a radioactive rift in his own head where his mom use to be- red and seeping on the wrong days, but there are more right days than wrong then there use to be) but maybe the newly baptized Max will help him remember why he wants to be fixed.

That he can be fixed.

That Herc Hansen has people who loved him enough to try.

Even if they have to emotionally use a pet as shorthand for love.

And apparently taking videos of your sweet girl grooming and riding an English bulldog could be a bonding exercise.

**Author's Note:**

> So I had to response to a world where Herc Hansen saved the world but lost the girl and he awkwardly tries to reconnect with the son he sent away.
> 
> I ended up watching cat videos and got this.


End file.
